Google Meet's AI action items and caption history just changed the meeting game

Focusing on the most important information in your work call is about to get a little easier. Google is rolling out a pair of new features for Meet today — one that will help you catch up on missed information and one that will help you plan for what to do after the meeting.

Expanded caption history

First up is a significant change to how live captions work. At present, Google says, captions display in real time but go away once they’re “no longer relevant to the current conversation.” With this change, you’ll be able to scroll back and review the last 30 minutes of live captions. There’s a “Jump to the bottom” button to go back to what’s happening currently. This is especially useful if you’re late to the meeting and want to catch up or want to reference specific details from earlier in the meeting.

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AI-generated ‘Next Steps’

Also new is a “Next Steps” feature, an expansion of the “Take Notes for me” feature that rolled out last fall. After a call is over, Google explains, Gemini will analyze meeting notes and automatically identify and organize actionable next steps into a new section. You can review and edit the steps if you want and assign the task to a specific person.

Google is starting to roll out both of these features today. Expanded captions should arrive for all users within about two weeks, but Next Steps is “rolling out at a much slower pace than usual.” Google added it may take more than two weeks for this feature to arrive for everyone as it keeps an eye on performance and quality.

Also: A major Gemini feature is now free for all users – no Advanced subscription required

Expanded captions history is available for all Google Workspace customers and users with personal Google accounts. Next Steps is available for Google Workspace Business Standard and Plus users, Enterprise Standard and Plus users, and users with the Gemini Education Premium add-on.